Balkans
clock | July 1, 2010Last week, my SciBling Jason Goldman interviewed me for his blog. The questions were not so much about blogging, journalism, Open Access and PLoS (except a little bit at the end) but more about science - how I got into it, what are my grad school experiences, what I think about doing research on animals, and such stuff. Jason posted the interview here, on his blog, on Friday, and he also let me repost it here on my blog as well, under the fold:
Here at Thoughtful Animal headquarters, we're starting a new series of seven-question interviews with people who are doing or have done animal…
clock | June 18, 2010Back in 1999, during the NATO bombing of Belgrade, Salon.com bragged that they could send a reporter to Serbia - the first online-only magazine to do such a thing. That was a sign that online-only journalism was maturing. But Dave Winer, while agreeing this is a sign of maturity for a US-based outlet, voiced the opinion that the Web was already there, in Yugoslavia, and that the people were on it, using it. Last week, Dave remembered that episode in a different context and I have, in a few posts before (regarding Mumbai attacks and Iran revolution), wondered why would American audience put…
clock | January 27, 2010One of the nice benefits of hosting ScienceOnline conferences is that I sometimes get presents. The one that I find totally fascinating that I got this year is the 2009 issue of Phlogiston, the Journal of History of Science published once a year in Serbian language - print only (the journal does not even have a homepage).
I got this issue from Jelka Crnobrnja-Isailovic who came all the way from Serbia to do a session on challenges to Open Access in developing countries together with her friend and colleague Tatjana Jovanovic-Grove.
The 2009 issue of Phlogiston is dedicated to Darwin and the…
clock | January 4, 2010
Remember that 'vampire' is one the few words that Serbian language gave to the world. Garlic is THE remedy against everything there.....
clock | December 22, 2009If a publisher offered me a contract to write a book under a title that would be something like "Unscientific America", how would I go about it?
I would definitely be SUCH a scientist! But, being such a scientist does not mean indulging in Sesquipedalian Obscurantism. Being such a scientist means being dilligent, thorough and systematic in one's reasearch. And then being excited about presenting the findings, while being honest about the degree of confidence one can have in each piece of information.
I was not offered a book contract, and I do not have the resources and nine or twelve months…
clock | October 22, 2009Open Access Week is in full swing and there is a lot of blogging about its various events in many countries.
OA week was marked in Serbia this year as well. As you may remember, I went to Belgrade twice in the past two years - in 2008 and 2009 and gave a total of four lectures, one brief TV interview, four long radio interviews and a print interview. I am now writing a paper about Open Access for one of their journals as well.
This effort has paid off.
I have remarked before how difficult it is to make changes in smaller countries - the scientific community is small, everyone knows everybody…
clock | July 17, 2009As you may remember, a beautiful mammoth fossil was discovered in Serbia a couple of months ago. I promised I'd try to go and see it myself on my recent trip to Belgrade. And I did get to see it. But the story is more fun than just that.... ;-)
First, I tried to get in touch with Dr.Miomir KoraÄ, the Director of the Archaeological park Viminacium to ask for permission to photograph the fossil as well as to interview him. After a couple of e-mail addresses bounced, I got what I think is the correct address...but got no response.
Once I got to Belgrade, I asked my contacts there about this and…
clock | July 16, 2009A year ago, almost none of my old school friends were on Facebook. Today, many are.
Facebook statistics show that this past year has seen a huge influx of people, globally, of roughly my age who are not techies or bloggers, just normal people. Over the past 5-6 years, Facebook has evolved and changed quite a lot. Some of the best and most liked functionalities on Facebook right now are blatant copies of the best aspects of FriendFeed and Twitter and Flickr and YouTube and Dopplr and LinkedIn and other services (some of which are now already dead).
As us oldsters are joining in great numbers…
clock | July 10, 2009As you know, I gave two lectures here in Belgrade. The first one, at the University Library on Monday, and the second one at the Oncology Institute of the School of Medicine at the University of Belgrade. As the two audiences were different (mainly librarians/infoscientists at the first, mainly professors/students of medicine at the second) I geared the two talks differently.
You can listen to the audio of the entire thing (the second talk) here, see some pictures (from both talks) here and read (in Serbian) a blog post here, written by incredible Ana Ivkovic who organized my entire Belgrade…
clock | June 5, 2009
An almost complete and beautifully preserved fossil of the Southern Mammoth, Mammuthus meridionalis was discovered a couple of weeks ago by a team of archaeologists led by Miomir KoraÄ from the Archaeological Institute Belgrade and the Director of the Archaeological park Viminacium in Eastern Serbia.
The fossil, pretty much articulated and all in one place, was discovered at a depth of 27 meters (about 88.5 feet) in sand, which indicates that this area did not experience a serious earthquake for at least a million years or more since the animal died. It was identified as a female. She was…
clock | June 1, 2009Later this month, I'll be attending the 59th Meeting of Nobel Laureates in Lindau, Germany. The list of Nobel Laureates (about 20 of them) and the list of about 600 young researchers from 66 countries are very impressive. Of course, not being a chemist, I'll have to do some homework before I go, learning what these people did to get the prizes.
The program certainly looks interesting - there is a lot of "meta" stuff beyond pure chemistry, so I will always find interesting sessions to attend and blog from. Yes, I am going to be there as a blog-reporter. I understand that PZ will also be there…
clock | May 30, 2009
Today is the 130th anniversary of the birth of Milutin Milankovic, a Serbian geophysicist best known for Milankovitch cycles that describe periodicities in Earth's climate.
Vedran Vucic is in Dalj (near Vukovar, Croatia), Milankovic's birthplace, today for the birthday celebrations. He says that the house in which Milankovic grew up has been renovated for the occasion. I am assuming it has been turned into a museum. As I will go to Serbia again this summer, perhaps Vedran and I can take a trip to Dalj, where a group of science popularizers are interested in hearing about Open Access…
clock | May 26, 2009Last year in May, when I visited Belgrade, I gave interviews with Radio Belgrade, talking about science publishing, Open Access, science communication and science blogging. The podcasts of these interviews - yes, they are in Serbian! - are now up:
Part 1
Part 2
I know that this blog has some ex-Yugoslavs in its regular audience, people who can understand the language. I hope you enjoy the interviews and spread the word if you like them.
clock | May 11, 2009
Petnica Science Center has been doing science summer camps for high school graduates and undergrads for 25 years and many of its alumni went on to have good careers in science both in Serbia and abroad:
Petnica Science Center is the biggest and, probably, the oldest independent nonprofit organization for extracurricular science education in SE Europe. Since 1982, Petnica has organized more than 2,500 programs (seminars, workshops, research camps...) for nearly 50,000 students and science teachers in 15 disciplines of science, technology and humanities. Majority of programs are designed for…
clock | February 21, 2009A couple of times over the past few years I tried to find if there was a Serbian restaurant in New York City, but Google could not find one. So, I gave up looking and assumed there wasn't one. And that was true - until recently. Last night at the meetup, Nikola Trbovic told me there is one now - opened just last June: Kafana on Avenue C (between 8th and 9th Street, see reviews here and here).
So, tonight, after watching the amazing August: Osage County on Broadway, The Bride Of Coturnix and I went to 'Kafana' to give it a try. And we were not disappointed - the atmosphere was pleasant and the…
clock | January 23, 2009New Sperm Shaker Set To Improve IVF Success Rates:
Scientists have developed a ground-breaking method for testing the quality of a sperm before it is used in IVF and increase the chances of conception.
Racial Bias Can Be Reduced By Teaching People To Differentiate Facial Features Better In Individuals Of A Different Race:
There may be a simple way to address racial bias: Help people improve their ability to distinguish between faces of individuals of a different race. Brown University and University of Victoria researchers learned this through a new measurement system and protocol they…
clock | December 22, 2008There is no clearer and better example of Artificial controversy than the War on Christmas, as Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity re-invent it every year in order to boost their tanking ratings. What War on Christmas? Just drive along a street and see all the lights on houses, go into a store and look at the merchandise while listening to the Christmas music, peer into people's windows to see decorated Christmas trees and presents, or turn on any radio station - Christmas is everywhere.
But, believe it or not, there are people who are even stupider than O'Reilly and Hannity - people who really…
clock | December 19, 2008From The Big Picture
2008 has been an eventful year to say the least - it is difficult to sum up the thousands of stories in just a handful of photographs. That said, I will try to do what I've done with other photo narratives here, and tell a story of 2008 in photographs. It's not the story of 2008, it's certainly not all stories, but as a collection it does show a good portion of what life has been like over the past 12 months. This is a multi-entry story, 120 photographs over three days:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Those are some amazing pictures. Some are gory. Some are poignant. Some are…